Iowa Sports Parents Need to Do Better
For the last 10 or so years, I have had the privilege of helping coach youth soccer in Cascade. These days, I find myself volunteering with multiple programs, including our summer recreation league, 5th and 6th grade soccer, and high school soccer. I also serve on our soccer board. It can be a lot of work, but I continue to do it because I genuinely enjoy being around the kids and being part of their development.
Over the years, I have come to believe that coaching youth sports is about a lot more than teaching kids how to pass, shoot, or defend. Those things matter, of course. But I also hope that the kids I coach learn something about responsibility, teamwork, respect, dealing with adversity, and how they present themselves to the people around them. Hopefully, I can be another trusted adult in their lives, someone they know they can talk to when they need it.
That's why I was particularly disgusted by something I witnessed at the Dyersville soccer league this past Sunday. I am not going to name the team, the players, the coach, or the parents involved. This isn't about publicly embarrassing a group of people. It is about something much bigger than one soccer game. If there were an award for sportsmanship that day, I am afraid theirs would have been placed directly in the garbage bin.
Things don't always go right on a soccer field, or in any competition for that matter. A referee misses a foul. A call goes against you. Maybe the call is simply wrong. It happens. I have coached long enough to see just about everything, and I have certainly been on the wrong end of some questionable calls myself.
My message to the kids I coach is pretty simple. If something goes wrong, pick your head up and get back to doing your job. If there is something that needs to be addressed, let coach handle it. Your job is to play the game. My job is to deal with the adults and officials when something needs to be discussed.
On the rare occasion that one of my players gets too frustrated or upset, they can come take a break with me. We talk, they calm down, and when they are ready, they go back to work. That's part of growing up. You are going to get frustrated in life. You are going to have things happen that you don't like. Learning how to deal with those moments is far more important than whether you win a particular soccer game. The team I watched before us on Sunday could have used a little of that.
First, let's talk about the referees. These people already take plenty of abuse from parents and fans standing on the sidelines. They do not need it from players or coaches too. Without referees, there is no game. They're there so our kids can play.
And yes, referees are going to make mistakes. So are coaches. So are players. That is part of sports and, frankly, part of life. Yelling at an official is not going to make your team play better. Losing your composure is not going to change the scoreboard. And flipping off a referee certainly isn't going to change the outcome of the game. The idea that a 16-year-old kid would think it is acceptable to flip off a referee is ridiculous to me. But what bothered me even more was seeing adults reinforce that atrocious behavior. Whether they were right about the referees or dead wrong, doesn't really matter here.
A coach was sent away from the field with a red card for the second year in a row, even if it was post-game for their players behavior. Whatever happened in that particular game, there is a bigger problem when the adults responsible for teaching young people how to behave cannot maintain their own composure. Even more troubling was watching parents cheer on their terrible behavior.
What exactly are we teaching these kids? We tell young athletes to respect their coaches. We tell them to listen to their parents. We tell them to respect officials. We tell them to control their emotions and be good teammates. But those lessons become pretty hollow when the adults standing on the sideline demonstrate the exact opposite.
Those kids are watching us, and they won't be kids forever.
That is something I try to remember every time I coach. If I tell my players to keep their mouths shut and let me handle a problem, then I had better be capable of doing the same thing. If I tell them to respect an official, I need to show them what that looks like. If I expect them to handle a bad call without losing their minds, I need to demonstrate that same composure.
If I cannot follow the rules I am asking them to follow, why should they listen to me?
I have spent many years competing in and coaching sports, and I have seen just about every kind of behavior you can imagine. As an athlete, I've been in the bad attitude camp. I have also learned that when you put yourself in a position of leadership, you have an obligation to be above reproach. That does not mean being perfect. It means understanding that people are watching you, especially young people.
Winning is great. I love winning. Ask anyone who has coached with me and they will tell you that I want our teams to compete. But winning is secondary when we are trying to raise young men and women.
A soccer trophy will eventually collect dust. A championship shirt will eventually end up in the back of a closet. The lessons a kid learns about how to handle disappointment, how to treat other people, and how to conduct themselves when things do not go their way can stick with them for the rest of their lives.
That's why I get frustrated when I see adults lose sight of what youth sports are supposed to be about. Parents, players, and coaches, be better.
Parents, remember that your kids are watching you. Coaches, remember that you are not just teaching a sport. You're helping shape young people. Players, understand that being competitive does not give you permission to be disrespectful, rude, or entitled to anything.
And to the referees, thank you. You volunteer your time, deal with complaints from the sidelines, make difficult calls, and allow our kids to play the game they love. You are not going to get every call right, just like none of us will get everything right. But you deserve to be treated with dignity and respect.
I feel like every year I write a similar article about sportsmanship, parents, coaches, or the way we treat the people who make youth sports possible. Unfortunately, this year has felt worse than most when it comes to fair play and treatment of referees, and it's only just begun for many.
Maybe that is why I felt the need to write this again.
We were all young once. Many of us had coaches, teachers, parents, and other adults who helped shape the people we eventually became. My own dad volunteered to coach me when I was growing up, and I suspect he had a much bigger influence on my decision to coach today than I'll ever admit to him. Now it is my turn to pass some of that along.
I hope the kids I coach remember some of the soccer skills we worked on. I hope someday they can even become great. I hope they remember the games we won and the ones we lost. But more than anything, I hope they remember that how you respond when things do not go your way says a lot about who you are. The kids are watching; let's make sure what they see is worth following.
Iowa Hawkeyes Who Have Won a Super Bowl
Gallery Credit: Tom Drake
Views from the Hawkeyes/Badgers Football Game on 10-14-23
Gallery Credit: Steve Pulaski